The Limits of Destiny
by tinx-r
Summary: How close is too close? Healing takes time.
Trapped. It's happened so often, maybe they should be used to it by now. It crosses Cody's mind that Murray maybe has an algorithm for it, something programmed into the Roboz - Boznapped In BASIC 1.9. Put in the parameters, punch out the results.

Or at least the bad guys, although punching out the bad guys is more in Nick's line.

Across the other side of the room, Nick's making more of a racket than he needs to, fighting the rope holding him prisoner, fighting the notion of helplessness, the possibility of this being where everything ends.

Cody knows Nick can't, won't even acknowledge an end, not now, not in the future. Not ever. It's not in him, and Cody has a crazy idea it's maybe what's kept them alive this long. Grenades and bullets and bombs, cars and mines, choppers, boats and everything under the deep blue sea - most things on earth have had a crack at the two of them, one way or another. Not to mention the crooks.

"Damn it, Cody." Nick's at his side now, bound arms free, bloodstains across his chest. "Don't you quit on me, you bastard."

"Wouldn't do me any good if I did," Cody replies, or tries to, but all that comes is a soft, high keening, as though his chest can't inflate enough to form words. He's irrationally disappointed in himself - Nick's free, after all, and doing all the work, and he can't manage a lousy sentence.

Nick's breath hitches, and he caresses Cody's face, fingers against temple, palm against cheek. Cody closes his eyes and gives in, resting in the touch, floating now, because he's Nick's - safe now, and Nick will fight for both of them.

"Cody! Cody, damn you, don't you dare!" Confused, shaken out of his haven, Cody's back on point, blinking for the threat, ready for anything. The dark is coming down, and he can't see an enemy - can't see anything except Nick, a pillar of fury with incongruous tears pouring down his cheeks.

More than anything Cody wants to reach up and blot those tears, kill them stillborn, ease the anger that darkens Nick's eyes. But his arms won't lift, his words won't come, and Nick's not touching him anymore and that - that's the hardest to take of all.

 _Are you angry with me?_ Cody thinks, and with the thought comes fear beyond all reason, beyond even the name. It takes his breath, chills his soul, darkens his sight until there's nothing left. "Touch me," he screams to the abyss, "don't leave me, don't leave me here," but there's no sound, not in this place where souls are lost.

All the dark he carries is spewing from him now - guilt and fear, death and fury. The hot black hell of the war that once he had thought would swallow him whole is upon him, around him, and all at once he knows he can _just let go_ and it will all be over.

The temptation is appalling, and in the face of the dark, he's close, so very close, but there's a shred of something inside him - a memory, a fragment of light, something so alien he cannot bear it - that _holds on_ , and will not let him.

"Touch me," he says again, and the sound - high, keening - is like a memory of itself, a sharp cold pain in his guts, in his heart. There's no air, and no light, and if this is how it ends, Nick had goddamn better touch him, hold him, and it better be soon, because if Nick's too late, Cody's never gonna forgive him.

* * *

Hospital. That happens pretty often too, but Cody guesses it doesn't need an algorithm. Just a plethora of forms and a fight about family-only.

Nick's won the fight this time. Cody knows, even though he can't open his eyes, can't even let Nick know he's awake. He knows because Nick is holding his hand, and Nick's other hand is soft against his cheek, and Cody wants so badly to fall into it, to let go because he's safe now… isn't he?

"Yes," Nick whispers against his temple, and soft lips brush his forehead. "You can let go, babe. You fought real good, and I got you safe now."

Cody's confused again because it was Nick's fight, not his, but in the end that's barely important. Because it's still not the end, Nick wouldn't believe, and somehow he won, even when Cody had already lost, because wasn't that what had happened back there? Cody had lost.

"Hey. Hey, take it easy, big guy. Are you hurting? What?"

This time, Cody's eyes work, and for a while all he does is stare at Nick. It's enough, more than enough, more than he deserves.

"Are you hurting?" Nick repeats, softer, and his hand is in Cody's hair.

Cody thinks he'll never hurt again, not while Nick keeps doing that. Not while Nick stays close. "Don't let go," he whispers, and Nick's eyes show his understanding.

"I will never let you go." Soft words against his skin, inside his heart, blowing back the void like it had never been.

"I nearly stopped fighting. Thought I was alone… Thought I'd lost. Thought I'd let you down." The admission costs him, more so when he sees the tears on Nick's cheeks. He rouses himself, reaching out until Nick catches his hand and presses it back to the bed.

"Not yet," Nick says gently. "Just lay back, take it easy. You're doing good, great, but no moving yet, okay?"

It's not okay, not when Nick looks so haunted, not when Cody aches to hold him, but Nick's stroking his shoulders instead, collarbone, breastbone, shoulder and back, over and over, and it's nearly enough.

"You gave it everything you had, an' you're still here." Nick kisses his forehead and Cody crosses his eyes, trying not to let Nick out of his sight, even for that. "Oh, babe. You held on an' you came back to me, an' that - they said you wouldn't, said no-one could…"

"I was so scared it was the end, and you weren't gonna be with me." The words are out before Cody can think, a simple, all-powerful truth. He has to hold Nick now, moving bedamned, and maybe Nick knows because he's close, so close, and one of them must have moved. Cody's not sure who, not sure where he finishes and Nick begins.

"I would have found you," Nick says, with conviction. "I would have found you."

Cody holds him with all the strength he has, and somehow it's enough. "I know."

* * *

It's been a quiet few weeks, first in the hospital, the last one home on the boat. Cody's body's a mess, the two deep stab wounds in his back taking their own sweet time to heal, the surgical incision across his abs where they'd rushed in to repair his spleen, or maybe it was his liver. He still gets hazy on the details, and Nick's tight-lipped, clear in every movement, every breath, that he'd rather not think about it, talk about it. Relive it.

Cody gets it, he does, but he still wants to know. The healing burns on his chest tell their own story, coupled with the bruising on his neck. Three transfusions, Murray tells him while Nick's in the shower, and Cody knows it was bad because Murray's white to the lips. "The veins in your arm had collapsed, that's why they had to put it in your neck."

"Nick told me something… They didn't think I'd make it."

"It was a bad time," Murray says simply, and looks away.

Cody has more to ask, so much more, but it's ripping Murray's guts out, and anyway, Nick's feet are on the stairs.

In the end, it's Joanna who tells him the details, reads the hospital notes with him and fills in the blanks. The silent hours after surgery when they'd been told he wouldn't make it, when they'd sat around his bed and waited for him to take his last breath.

"Nick… He was dying, too, right in front of our eyes. He couldn't touch you, couldn't speak - I was really frightened for him, Cody. I thought we'd lost you already, and I think… I don't know. If your heart had stopped, I think his would have too."

 _Couldn't touch me._ The abyss of lost souls is something Cody will never forget. "Then what happened?"

"You just… didn't quit. By morning they had you back on a drip, and a few hours later they were fighting for you. You had four surgeries in about three days, and then at last they said they thought you were gonna make it."

"Four days… I was dying for four days?"

"No," Nick says from the top of the aft stairs. He's lounging against the wall, outwardly relaxed but Cody can see he's coiled like a cat in a bad part of town. "You fought like the stubborn son of a bitch you are. You weren't dying, not for one second, you never gave up. You just don't know how."

Cody thinks of lost fights and drowning in the dark, and if he could, he'd run to his partner now and never let go. But he's propped on the bench seat, supported with pillows, and moving isn't easy, not yet.

"Thank God you made it," Joanna says fervently, and there's more, words and cheek-kisses and pets until he can't stand it anymore. But Nick's still by the stairs, still watching, still close.

"Thanks for coming, Jo, but he's gotta rest now."

* * *

Rest is a demon these days, something Cody's forced into because he lacks the strength for anything else. His mind's stir crazy, his body's on fire with pain, itch, weakness - he can't relax, but moving, even something as simple as taking a leak, or fetching a cup of coffee, takes careful consideration, planning, and at least one of his partners nearby in case things don't go according to plan.

Joanna's long gone, and Cody's downstairs in the stateroom, leak taken, coffee on the nightstand, Nick lounging on the other bunk. Later, Nick will change the dressings on his back, smooth cool cream into the burning itch, check the surgical wound across his belly and apply more tape. Touch him. But now, Nick's two feet and half a world away, not touching, not speaking, and it's too much like those silent hours in the dark.

 _Help me. Hold me. I need you._ Cody sips his coffee, slow, cautious, wary of his shaking hands. He can't ask for what he needs, doesn't know how - there's no precedent for this. Usually Nick's ahead of the game, way ahead of Cody, giving more than Cody can take.

"Are you angry with me?" Cody puts his coffee down, unable to prevent some slopping over the side. Unable to prevent the fat, slow tears which have chosen this moment to fight themselves free. Somehow he's let Nick down, he can't fight that feeling - he should be well by now, or maybe been faster, never been hurt at all.

"What?" Nick's off his bunk, close, quick, and there's anger in his face.

Cody closes his eyes against it, feeling tears fight on through. Perversely it's good to be right, even though what he wants, what he needs, is Nick's gentleness, Nick's presence. _Don't leave me. Please._

"Angry with you?" Nick's on the bunk with him, gentle, close, and Cody can breathe deep, deeper as Nick slides arms around him, eases him back. "Take it easy. C'mon, big guy, don't cry, it's too hard on your lungs, you know that. I gotcha, okay? I gotcha."

Cody coughs a little but instead of pain, he's got Nick. Wrapped around him, holding him up, strong chest against his injured back. "Don't let go," he ventures, and his reward is Nick's lips against his cheek, Nick's arms around his chest.

"Never," Nick says, low and strong, and Cody hears the vow deep inside. "You think I'm angry. Well, I am, but not with you. I was slow, the doctors were assholes, your heart stopped, and I sat and watched them give up on you. I'm angry, I'm scared, and I feel like I let you down in there, when they told me you weren't gonna make it. God forgive me, Cody, I believed them. _I believed them._ But you never quit, even when I did, and what kind of partner does that make me?"

"I held on because you weren't there." Cody realizes it all at once, and it turns his bones to water. "I thought it was the end, but I was too afraid to let go without you." Nick's arms are tight around his chest, and Nick's breathing in his ear has turned rough, ragged. "That's what I remember, anyhow."

"You held on, an' that's what matters." Nick's voice is choked with tears. "And there ain't gonna be a next time, so we're good. I'm sorry I left you alone, pal."

"S'okay." Cody leans in, snuggles in, wrapping himself in Nick. "Right now, I need this," he confides softly. "Need you close. Touching me. Is that okay?"

"Sure. Of course." Nick breathes him in then lays down, easing Cody against him so that Cody ends up on his side facing Nick, tucked into the curve of his body, sheltered. Loved.

It's what he needs, what he's missed, and he holds on with all his strength, letting go at last. There's nothing now, no pain, no fear - Nick's arms are safety, truth, forever. Nick's his harbor, his home, and that's been true since '72.

Nick breathes against his hair, and Cody hears the words inside the silence. _Don't leave me._ His own need, his own pain, his own fear. "Stay with me always," he says, and maybe he's babbling, maybe he's out of line, but right now he doesn't care. "Tell me, promise me. I love you."

Nick's breath hitches. "I love you too, man. You know that, right?"

Cody does, always has, it's their unspoken truth and always has been, but the void is dark at Cody's back, and he needs more. Everything. "I know." He seeks Nick's eyes, fearful, needing.

"Always," Nick says softly, and his eyes are wet with tears. "I've always loved you, and I always will. When they told me you were gonna die, that was it for me. Everything finished. You know?"

Cody knows. Nick's seen the void too, walked its edge, and the knowledge calms his mind, mends his heart.

For now, it's enough.


End file.
